Germany has pledged to fund its quarter share of the development cost for the tri-national Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS), having closed a six-month debate that had frozen work on German-supplied components of the system at a critical time.
A $3.4 billion development contract can now be awarded to the industries of Germany, Italy and the USA. Critics in the German parliament had raised alarms after MEADS last year disclosed a $500 million cost increase during the development phase. Germany also faces further costs to adapt the BGT IRIS-T short-range air-to-air missile to function with the MEADS launcher.
The USA and Italy continued development work on MEADS while the German debate stretched from September through April. Full-scale development work had been scheduled to begin in the third quarter of last year.
MEADS is expected to be deployed in three blocks in 2008, 2010 and 2013, with operational deployment in Italy and Germany in 2012 and in 2017 for the US Army.
The system is expected to provide 360° coverage against incoming, medium-range ballistic missiles, using the Lockheed Martin Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) air-defence missile to intercept targets in the baseline configuration.
Source: Flight International